Fracture Read online

  Fracture

  Written by:

  KL Hughes

  ©Copyright 2013 KL Hughes

  Original Source – by KL Hughes

  Kindle Edition – Build 4/15/2013

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the copyright owner, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review to be printed in a newspaper, magazine, or journal.

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, brands, names, and events portrayed, referenced, or mentioned here are products of the author’s imagination and/or are used fictitiously.

  Dedication

  This book is dedicated to those who love through diversity, who love through opposition, who love through pain, and who love through oppression. Love is a precious gift, a gift that knows no definition and does not discriminate. Love is beyond race, nationality, political affiliation, religious affiliation, age, and gender. Love is free, as are those who love freely.

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  Chapter 1

  The day was dragging horribly, every hour creeping by like a century. The slow tapping of the tip of her pen against the black metal and glass desk easily managed to lull Leigh into a hypnotic daydream of rhythmic tapping and the steady swooshing sound of the printers on the 8 floor. She stared blankly up at the black and red rectangular clock on the wall, mentally willing it to jump ahead six hours so that she could fly out the door, hit the coffee shop on 16, down a delicious vanilla mocha latte with a blissful shot of caramel, and be walking through the crimson sliding door to her loft within minutes. She hadn’t slept in what felt like a year, but really had only been around 32 hours. She’d tried to sleep the night before, but there was no bargaining with her overly active brain, which insisted she finish the last seven chapters of her latest not-so-masterful masterpiece. It would undoubtedly need a lot of work, but still, she couldn’t help the flutter of pride in her gut for finally having finished the manuscript that had tormented her for three years now. The swooshing sound of the printers suddenly somehow lost their perfect timing with one another and the upset in rhythm broke Leigh's trance just enough to pull her eyes away from the clock.

  “Jesus, does anyone here ever stop printing?” She groaned to herself, leaning her plush office chair back as far as it would tilt, rubbing a quick hand down her face before sliding it through her long, heavy, light brown locks, and cracking her neck to both sides in an attempt to wake herself up.

  “Well, it is a publishing company, Leigh. What do you expect?” the familiar voice answered her loudly, which literally surprised Leigh enough to cause her to push back too far on her already tilted chair, sending her tumbling backward and crashing into the floor, legs flying into the air with reckless abandon.

  “Fuck!” She let out a loud expletive as she tried to pull herself out of the awkward bundle of limbs that the fall had twisted her into. The loud, boisterous laughing from the doorway was enough to piss her off and amuse her all at the same time. She pulled herself back up to her desk, grabbed her stress ball, and chunked it at her friend’s head before bubbling over into a laughing fit all her own.

  “You are such an ass, J,” Leigh exclaimed as she walked over to the open doorway of her office and pulled her friend into a tight embrace. The 6-foot-3, slim yet muscle-bound figure of Jared Patel met her embrace with a tight squeeze before leaning back and planting an affectionate kiss on her lips.

  “Yes, I know this, but that’s the only reason we’re friends, now isn’t it?” J countered with another laugh. He sauntered past her to take the seat in front of her desk, setting a large, steaming coffee cup that she hadn’t noticed him holding before, down on her desk.

  “Oh, I love you, I love you, I love you,” Leigh groaned out as she greedily grabbed the coffee, planting another kiss on J’s cheek before making her way around the desk, picking up her surprisingly unbroken office chair, and carefully settling herself into it. She cradled her gloriously caffeinated coffee to her chin, inhaling the scent, before nursing out a few heavenly sips. Mmm, vanilla mocha latte with a shot of caramel, she thought as the familiar flavors delightfully assaulted her tongue. J knew her almost better than she knew herself.

  “You should, sweetie,” said J, “because you are not going to believe what else I got you.” He arched a perfectly tweezed eyebrow at her, trying his hardest not to let the slow upward curl at the corners of his mouth give away the surprise. Leigh stared at him curiously for a moment, before their pinpoint silent communication kicked in, sending her jaw slamming into her chest as realization took over.

  “No, you didn’t! Shut up, you didn’t!” She exclaimed, any ounce of exhaustion she may have had oozing out of her as she put her hands up to cover her mouth in shock, suddenly wide awake. “When? How? What did he say?”

  “Girl, yes I did,” J answered, his grin finally breaking across his lips as he momentarily shoved aside his signature air of class and elegance for a sheer diva moment that this particular occasion was incredibly deserving of. “We had a morning mandatory yesterday to go over the tour dates for Westin’s new thriller series, and afterwards, I approached Brad about your manuscript. I simply told him that I had a brilliant new work from a new author that I thought was worth taking the time to check out. I thought he was going to shut me down at first. You know how he hates taking on breakouts, and he had that horribly sour look on his face, but then I reminded him of the favor he owed me for hooking him up with Janice at last year’s Christmas party, so he agreed to look it over.”

  “Wow, Janice must’ve really rocked his world,” Leigh teased with a brilliantly wide, sparkling white smile.

  “Girl, you know she did. She may be poised in person, but she’s a freak in the sheets, at least, according to the many late-night conversations we’ve had in the office,” he responded with a snorting laugh.

  “Oh my god, J,” Leigh sighed out, her heart thumping excitedly in her chest. “I can’t believe Brad is actually going to read my manuscript.”

  “Correction,” J chimed in. “Brad has already read your manuscript.”

  “What? You said you just gave it to him yesterday!”

  “I know what I said! And I’m telling you again, he’s already read it. He apparently read it last night.”

  “That book is over 500 pages long!”

  “That’s what I said when he told me, but then I noticed the entirely unflattering black circles eating at his already wrinkled eyelids, and asked if he’d slept. He said he was up all night reading your manuscript. Couldn’t put it down.”

  Leigh could feel the tears stinging at the back of her eyes as her skin tickled and itched all over. Excitement and anxiety flushed her ivory flesh, painting the exposed portion of her chest a tender pink that rose up her neck to her cheeks and ears. J leveled his gaze with hers, the tears in his own eyes bubbling to the surface. Their glassy stares locked on each other as he nodded his head.

  “He wants to sign you,” J said, his voice cracking a bit as the tears crested and rolled over his eyelids at the same time as Leigh’s broke free. They both jumped up from their positions and locked into another powerful embrace. J danced Leigh around in their embrace, both of them crying and laughing and practically shouting their excitement. This was really happening.

&n
bsp; Leigh had finished that manuscript six years ago, before she ever even got her job at Capner Publishing Company. She’d sent it to several publishing houses in the past and had received more rejection letters than the corkboard in her studio apartment had room for. After a while, she put her beloved manuscript on the shelf where it sat untouched, collecting dust. A year later, she’d gotten an entry level job at CPC, and within two years had worked her way up to an executive office position, making six figures a year. It had been incredible really, and now, surreal, to have suddenly gone from slumming it in the city in sweatpants to stomping the sidewalk in four-inch heels and thousand-dollar suits. At that point, she knew she most likely could have gotten someone at CPC to read her manuscript and maybe even publish it, but she knew that when she finally did get it published, she didn’t want anyone to think that she’d gotten there through favoritism within her own company.

  She’d met J shortly after making executive when Rachel, one of the girls in her office, took her to a popular new night club downtown called Swank for a night out with the girls, and apparently one guy—Jared Patel. Leigh and J had instantly clicked that night, bonding over the publishing industry, their shared passion for literature, unique fashion (especially since she could finally afford to indulge in it), and vanilla mocha lattes with a shot of caramel. They became the best kind of soul-mates—inseparable best friends, fiercely loyal to one another, and impeccably honest with each other. She loved him deeply. He was the first person to make the big city finally feel like home.

  Leigh squeezed J even tighter as the memory of the night they met flashed sweetly through her mind. “I love you,” she whispered through her tears.

  “I love you, too, honey,” he whispered back. “I love you, too.”

  Later that evening, Leigh stood in front of the massive, vertical mirror bracketed to the wall of her studio staring at herself, clad in only dark blue lace panties and matching bra, holding up outfit after outfit as J laid out behind her on her bed watching and shaking his head no to each outfit she presented. Thankfully, he’d let her nap for a few hours before sneaking into her studio apartment—he was the only person who had a key other than Leigh—to insist that they get ready to go out and celebrate her new publishing contract.

  “Seriously?” Leigh questioned his last rejection. “You love that dress.”

  “No, I love you in that dress,” he corrected her. “It’s hideous on the hanger, gorgeous on your petite frame, but it’s not right for the occasion. You need something freer, and hotter. Try jeans. Ooo-I know!” J jumped up from the bed as an apparently brilliant revelation struck his brain. He practically skipped over to Leigh’s wardrobe, taking out a pair of dark-wash skinnies, a solid white slim-fit button-up, a blazing blue short-cropped leather jacket, and a pair of vibrantly blue pumps to match. He threw them across the chair beside the mirror and signaled for Leigh to try them on.

  “Damn, I’m a genius,” J said, nodding in approval as Leigh checked her profile in the mirror. She was so snugly fit in the clothes, that it was lucky there wasn’t an ounce of fat on her, because there’s no way it wouldn’t have shown through the material when it was bound that tightly to her body. She whispered a silent thank you to J for dragging her out of bed every morning and making her run in the park with him. Her rigid, ribbed abdomen showed through the snow-white of the button-up shirt beneath her open leather jacket. She had to admit, standing at nearly 5’10’’ in her heels, she looked good. He really was a genius, though that much had always been true. She ran a quick, hard hand through her chocolate locks, before letting them fall messily around her shoulders, and turning to J for one final judgment.

  “Perfect,” he told her, nodding with a grin. “Now, let’s go get some eyes on that perfect ass and a drink in your hand. It’s time to celebrate, and honey, I intend on keeping you out all night long.”

  “A drink sounds perfect, but the last thing I care about is having eyes on my ‘perfect ass’,” she laughed out, motioning sarcastic air-quotes around those last two words as the two of them made their way out of her studio and down onto the bustling streets of the city.

  “Who said anything about your ass? I was talking about myself!” J teased her, the both of them linking arms as he hailed a cab to sweep them away to a night of pure ecstasy and celebration.

  Chapter 2

  The bass thumped loudly beneath Leigh’s feet, deliciously vibrating up her legs, as she and J made their way through the mass of grinding bodies and over to the bar. She knew after a few drinks, she’d be helpless to stop herself from setting a fire on the dance floor. Their small group of close-knit friends was waiting for them at the far corner of the bar, and as soon as J and Leigh strolled up, Rachel shoved two shots into their hands, before raising her own shot glass into the air.

  “To Leigh!” She shouted above the steady kicking beat of the music. Everyone echoed her cry in unison before knocking back their shots. Afterwards, they clapped and each took their turn embracing Leigh, who allowed the pink rush of heat to shamelessly crawl up her neck to her ears as was her natural reaction to being made the center of attention. She thanked them all for coming and for the congratulations before grabbing another drink. After a while, everyone pulled away into their own conversations, some of them making their way out to the dance floor, as J and Leigh continued to knock them back at the bar. After the fifth shot, Leigh shook her head to signal that she needed a break or she’d be on her ass in no time, to which J only laughed before pulling her out into the throng of gyrating bodies.

  The hard, sexy bump of the music vibrating into her ears and through the rest of her body mixed nicely with the fizzling effect of the alcohol in her stomach as Leigh reached back to slide a slim, ivory, well-manicured hand around the neck of her best friend, who fell in rhythm with her hips behind her, their bodies grinding suggestively against one another. That is, suggestively to anyone watching. To each other, it was just harmless fun—nothing more, nothing less—fueled by their connection, their incredible ability to laugh at each other under any circumstances, to be deeply and respectfully affectionate with one another, and the fact that each was fluent in the thoughts and language of the other. Besides, as hot a couple as they would make and as many people there were who mistakenly thought them to be, Leigh and J were playing for entirely opposite teams—he, a man-loving hunk of fashion and class, and she, a lipstick lesbian through and through.

  Once the heated dance finished its run as the song waned and melded into the intro of another, Leigh made her way over to her empty, shaded booth in the back corner of the club, while J went to get fresh drinks and attempt to locate their scattered group of friends. Leigh could feel the strut in her walk as she headed to the booth. It was never intentional. In heels, she couldn’t help herself. It was like gravity just grabbed onto her petite hips and forced her to sashay her way down imaginary runways. She flicked a hand through her long hair, throwing it over her shoulder to let a wave of cool air brush across the overheated back of her neck as she slid into the booth and settled her eyes on the crowd.

  This booth was always empty. The managers made sure of it—they kept it clear, reserved for her and anyone she might have tagging along with her, which was usually only J. She had become somewhat of a celebrity at this particular nightclub, though she could never quite put her finger on the reason. It was a known lesbian club, sure, but there were plenty of lesbians in the city that weren’t getting preferential treatment or excess attention. Then again, this club was fairly high-class. You wouldn’t stumble upon just anyone there, at least not anyone who didn’t fall into one of three main categories—stunningly beautiful, extremely wealthy, or incredibly important. She knew she was at least one of those, though definitely not incredibly important. Wealthy, though—much more accurate. About a year and a half ago, she’d asked her best friend about it, and J had attributed her bit of fame and favoritism at the bar to her “untouchable physique, stacked bank account, and icy reputation for sending
girls packing.” Leigh hadn’t known what to make of the remark at first.

  “What do you mean ‘icy reputation for sending girls packing’?” She’d questioned him, a slight tone of shock apparent in her voice. J was the only person who ever called her out on anything.

  “Oh please, Leigh, you know you’re an ice queen,” he’d retaliated. “It’s one of the sexiest things about you. There’s nothing wrong with it, honey. You like what you like, and don’t we all? You just actually have enough taste and self-respect to stick to it rather than settling for whatever oversexed les’ throws herself at your feet.”

  “Ice queen? You think I’m an ice queen?” She’d feigned a bit of hurt in her voice, though the comment hadn’t actually surprised her. She really did have a reputation for being frigid. Some of the junior secretaries at CPC were absolutely terrified of her.

  “Need I remind you of the night we met?” J had answered her, a smirk crawling across his lips. Leigh laughed out loud when the memory flashed. The night they’d met at Swank, two different people had approached her, one a man and the other a woman. She remembered it clearly. The guy had inappropriately pushed into her from behind before pretending he’d just lost his footing, and then proceeded to try and ask her to dance. Leigh hadn’t even bothered to turn and look at him. She simply put a hand up to silence him before walking away. The girl was a different story. She’d come onto Leigh entirely too strong, dropping not-so-subtle hints about what she’d like to do with the slim brunette.

  “Okay, that’s not fair,” Leigh whined at J. “That guy was inappropriate and the girl was…just, ugh. Pathetic is the only word that comes to mind.” She’d hated to sound so cruel, but it was the truth. Leigh considered overt sexuality and lewd behavior to be an extreme turn-off. There was absolutely nothing sexy about behaving in a way that says, ‘I have no self-respect whatsoever.’ In fact, she considered it downright degrading to women to dress, speak, and act like such a stereotypical slut. Her idea of sexy—class, poise, sophistication, intelligence.